The present invention relates to a device used for expanding articles such as soft bags at the point of sale and in particular to collapsible soft bag expanders.
Retail stores such as K Mart or Wal-mart often display soft bags, such as tote bags, luggage or the like. It is desirable to display the bags in an expanded form in order to catch the attention of the ultimate consumer. Many of these bags are manufactured overseas and then imported into the United States. Soft bags are not generally shipped in the expanded condition because shipping costs tend to be very high for bulky materials as a result of the wasted space in an expanded bag. Alternatively, labor costs for expanding the bags at the point of sale can also be expensive. Therefore, it is advantageous to have a bag expander inserted into the soft bag at the point of manufacture, compress the bag and expander and ship the bag in its compressed form. Then when the bags reach the point of sale the retail seller need only remove force from the bag and the expander inside will return to its expanded shape to puff the bag up into its fully expanded form.
Such bag expanders are known in the art from U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,934,803, 4,077,451, 4,141,399 and 4,993,846. Each of these patents teach a device for expanding soft bags using various mechanisms. The concept of using panels and springs for expanding luggage using the insert is well known in the prior art and the use of foldable panels for expansion to separate the layers and keep them under tension is also well known in the art. The prior art expanders have been satisfactory however, they suffer from the disadvantage that they only provide stable support at a single position within the bag and do not provide support throughout the bag.